Jeremiah 8:5–10

⁵Then why have the people of Jerusalem turned away from me?

Why do they always turn away?

They keep on telling lies.

They refuse to come back to me.

⁶I have listened carefully.

But they do not say what is right.

They refuse to turn away from their sins.

No one says, ‘What have I done?’

All of them go their own way.

They are like horses charging into battle.

⁷Storks know when to fly south.

So do doves, swifts and thrushes.

But my people do not know

what I require them to do.

⁸“ ‘ “How can you people say, ‘We are wise.

We have the law of the Lord’?

Actually, the teachers of the law have told lies about it.

Their pens have not written what is true.

⁹Those who think they are wise will be put to shame.

They will become terrified. They will be trapped.

They have not accepted my message.

So what kind of wisdom do they have?

¹⁰I will give their wives to other men.

I will give their fields to new owners.

Everyone wants to get richer and richer,

from the least important of them to the most important.

Prophets and priests alike

try to fool everyone they can.